Israel

Middle Eastern Realities

Obama Chooses American Defeat

October 30, 2011 — budsimmons

Obama Chooses American Defeat

James G.
Wiles

In April, 2007, at the height of
American casualties during the Surge in Iraq, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid
(D. Nev.) famously announced
“the war is lost.” His remark attracted national headlines – and a big push-back
from Republicans, who, in the wake of the 2006 elections, controlled neither
House of Congress.

An American President – George W.
Bush of Texas – had refused to accept defeat. He changed his military leaders,
launched the Surge and victory followed. And, even though, the Republicans had
lost control of Congress, President Bush’s control of the Executive branch and
the American people’s refusal to accept defeat prevailed over leading Democrats’
desire for American defeat.. It enabled the forces of the Sunni Awakening,
General Petraeus and the coalition’s troops to crush the Iraq
insurgency.

Over a thousand American soldiers died in
Iraq after Leader Reid’s remarkable press conference.

Democrats, like Reid, who’d predicted
defeat, never changed their views. Now, President Barack Obama has just
guaranteed that Senator Reid’s remark will come true. Iraq is not Vietnam and
the Middle East is not Southeast Asia. Yet, the parallels – 36 years after a
Democratic Congress cut off U.S. funding for South Vietnam – are
unsettling.

Once again, a leader of the
Democratic Party has opted for American defeat – after a splendid American field
army has achieved military victory. Former New York Times Baghdad
bureau chief John Burns predicted disaster as a result of Mr. Obama’s decision
on Hugh
Hewitton October 24. “We’ll see” was the most optimism Pulitzer-Prize
winner Dexter
Filkins could muster on his New Yorker blog.

These guys aren’t
conservatives. But, with Michael Yon, these famous war correspondents are
not hopeful about whether America’s sacrifice in Iraq will be
redeemed..

How can Democrats ever be trusted
with America’s national security again?

It’s a simple as
that.

Read Fred and Kimberly Kagan’s
excellent piece this weekend in the new issue of the Weekly
Standard for the post-mortem. The Kagans were part of the intellectual
brain trust behind the Surge – the Surge which President Obama has just thrown
away.